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Rep. Jeff Miller, chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs, said that giving the government's top award for its senior professionals to VA regional director Michael Moreland showed there was no limit to the "VA's tone deafness."

OPM only has the award proposal presented by the agency to go by. It highlights a distinguished career with many major accomplishments. It isn't a background check to vet the individual for public office or to dig up every poor decision he or she ever made. It also doesn't evaluate every aspect of every organization under their purview. The IG report didn't point any fingers at him, and he wasn't directly in charge of the day to day operations of this hospital.
I am not a great fan of a program where SES gets to select each other for a lifetime achievement award of 35%, that isn't available to rank and file civil servants, but in this case I don't see any evidence that he caused this problem or made it worse in any way.

If you want to run the Federal Govt like a private business, then you have to pay large cash awards to those who generate income or savings. Even Govt Contractors get big increases in pay and bonuses, last month a million dollar increase made the news, why is something less than $100,000 a big deal for a Govt employee. I think a bonus over $250,000 would require review by all members of Congress worth over $10M if the Agency giving the award has a room large enouph for them all to meet in. Maybe it would have been better to offer the award as a life income source of 1 - 5% of the annual savings as long as the employee is living. The real problem is more people don't get these type of awards for the savings they implement. I for one believe Congress is on the wrong track ... they can't afford to run the Federal Govt like a private business or industry, this issue is an example of them wanting it both ways. When we start paying people on a commision for income and sales made, I would like to work for the IRS, but only for a few years so others can share in future commisions.

Get rid of the SES. The SES is a class system, they used to be lowly GS'ers GS-15,17,and 18. but the SES system was created where they get extra bennefits. Here you can see how it got abused. They can get a 35% bonus where lowly GS'ers can only get up to 1% of thier pay as a bonus. SES can carry over 600 hrs of annual leave, GS'ers only 240 hrs. Some of these folks get SES at a young age and sit in that position drawing huge incomes for years not contributing anything and you can't get rid of them. SES needs a 5 year term limit. After 5 yrs at SES, forced retirement and let someone else in.